Alibaba's digital payments offshoot Ant Financial recently announced it had given up on its planned purchase of US cash transfer company MoneyGram International as the $1.2 billion offer failed to gain approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS). Ant Financial said it will pay MoneyGram a $30 million breakup fee for the collapse of the deal. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/10 0:18:39

As 2018 will be crucial to China's efforts to tame the country's bubbly real estate market, authorities should be wary of any possible resurgence in speculative buying as curbs are relaxed.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/8 22:48:39

Located on the Indochina Peninsula, Cambodia is an important stop on the ancient Maritime Silk Road and a pivot for the construction of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. The profound cooperation between China and Cambodia under the framework of the Belt & Road (B&R) initiative has provided important support for the extension of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road to the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific region. In the future, China should address and control the potential risks, intensify the cooperation and find more ways to make China-Cambodia cooperation a new model of international cooperation under the framework of the B&R initiative. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/8 22:23:40

Europe's market big bang offers clear pain for a fuzzy gain. The overhaul of financial rules bundled in the European Union's MiFID II directive is designed to make finance fairer and safer. But that laudable aim comes at a heavy cost, with an unrealistic deadline, and may open up new regulatory loopholes. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/8 22:23:39

On July 18, 2017, China notified the WTO it would stop importing four categories of solid waste covering 24 types of material, including polyvinyl chloride by the end of the year. The General Administration of Customs has also acted against the smuggling of “foreign waste.”
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/7 23:48:39

China should pay more attention this year to the quality and effectiveness of its economic cooperation with and assistance to Pakistan, as ties are set to get closer amid hostility from the US.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/7 23:43:39

The fact that inflation has remained stubbornly low across the global North has come as a surprise to many economic observers. In September, the always sharp and thoughtful Nouriel Roubini of New York University attributed this trend to positive shocks to aggregate supply – meaning the supply of certain goods has increased, driving down prices.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/7 23:33:39

Much of the stock market's recent boom resided in an acronym – FAANG, standing for Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google. As important as they've become, investors tired of this trade can look forward in 2018 to a new set of letters to jumble into a more exciting investment thesis. Call it SLAW.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/7 23:28:39

While many have been focusing on the Chinese “label” on a $1 billion project near Sri Lanka's main port of Colombo, less attention has been paid to the economic logic behind this investment. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/4 22:28:41

A shares just smashed another record, with 2017 seeing an unprecedented number of new listings on the two main bourses in the Chinese mainland. But although it may seem like a milestone, it should prompt calls for faster and more fundamental reforms of the mainland equity market.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/4 21:18:40

China has achieved much since 1978, when its reform and opening-up began. In terms of headline economic progress, the pace of China's transformation over the past 40 years is unprecedented. The country's GDP grew by nearly 10 percent per year on average, while reshaping global trade patterns and becoming the second-largest economy in the world. This success lifted 800 million people out of poverty, and the mortality rate of children under five years old was halved between 2006 and 2015. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/4 21:18:39

In 2018, China is likely to make great strides in promoting free trade agreements (FTAs) that will frame new rules and norms governing global trade and investment.
China will pursue negotiations of 10 FTAs in 2018, while carrying out feasibility studies for 10 other agreements, the Economic Information Daily, a publication of the Xinhua News Agency, said in a recent report, citing a Ministry of Commerce official.
Source: Global Times | 2018/1/3 23:13:39

There is little doubt that the excitement around artificial intelligence (AI) in China will continue in 2018, but it's worth noting that the country's AI sector is facing a somewhat paradoxical situation. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/3 22:23:39

When it comes to Chinese acquisitions in European soccer and vice versa, the score is $3 billion-nil. A string of investments in storied European clubs, from Atletico Madrid to AC Milan, stopped abruptly when China put its foot down in 2017. The Abu Dhabi- and Chinese-owned group behind Manchester City could be the first heavyweight to bet the other way. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/3 22:18:39

China has shown its determination to tackle pollution by shifting from coal to natural gas. But the government is not solely responsible for the gas supply shortage this winter. Oil and gas companies didn't expect or plan for the rapid growth of natural gas demand. Source: Global Times | 2018/1/2 23:08:40